the lights just went down
by skyparents
Summary: and so this is how humanity either begins a new chapter or closes the book entirely: with you, letting your daughter be shot with a tranquilizer gun, holding onto her like you'll never see her again. "earth, clarke," you whisper into her hair. "you get to go to earth." the oxygen tastes stale again, and now you know why. / basically a character study up to the pilot.
**NOTES** / _I'm on a roleplay site based on the show where I play both Abby and Raven, and I thought maybe I'd post their apps because they are, essentially, character studies. The site goes AU after the dropship reaches the ground, so they only go up to the beginning of the pilot episode, and are based on what we know of the character's history and what I added or imagined myself. So here's Abby's (because she's my fav). This is technically the first writing I've ever done based on The 100 and I'm nervous about it so I hope you guys like it!_

* * *

You've always wanted to go to the ground, but it's not going to happen. That's something you learn early, how _improbable_ your dreams are.

But you are determined to _be_ somebody, to do something that will make the Ark a better place. So you restrict the ground to your imagination, painting pictures of it on the insides of your eyelids to look at when you close your eyes, and you begin to search for a new dream. A more realistic dream.

You settle on medicine when you're eleven years old, focus everything you have on that. Your parents aren't sure how to react to this, the way you sit leaning over textbooks while all the other kids your age are still playing tag in the hallways. But you don't want to play games; you want to learn. You want to pack as much information in as you possibly can so that you can be somebody. And so you sit still and wide-eyed in class like the more you open your eyes, the more you'll see, the more you'll know.

There's a small hiccup in your plans, a distraction that comes in the form of Jake Griffin. It's not like he just appears in your life out of nowhere; he's always been there, in the shadows, not really in your orbit until you're seventeen. It takes a sudden impact and a crash of several books falling to the floor for you to _really_ notice him (you notice everything _but_ people, it seems) and then there's no turning back. Full speed ahead, every second with him gathering energy. You're drawn to him like a moth to a flame, an old expression from the ground that people still use without fully knowing the meaning of. The oxygen on the Ark seems stale, even if it's all you've ever known, but he makes the air taste cleaner somehow.

Jake Griffin is going to _be_ somebody. Maybe that's why you fall in love with him, the same way he falls in love with you because you're going to be somebody, too.

Other people roll their eyes at the thought of Jake Griffin and Abby Kennedy being important somehow, but you prove them wrong, together. Flash forward ten years and you're a doctor, just like you wanted to be, and Jake's on the team that deals with the Ark's environment. And you have a daughter: A beautiful bundle of energy who realigns everything in your world. Clarke. She becomes the most important thing in your life, the one that you revolve around. She comes to work with you, sits out of the way while you treat your patients and watches, asks questions and listens to the answers, wide-eyed like you used to be.

Time passes. Clarke grows, hair flying in blonde waves behind her, always moving. You get promoted once, twice, three times, taking on the title of Chief Medical Officer, and Jake becomes Senior Environmental Engineer. You both wind up on the Council after Thelonious becomes Chancellor, begin to get a say in the decisions made on the Ark. You're no longer teenagers, holding hands and talking about all the good you're going to do. The people who used to roll their eyes at you are looking up to you (it feels strange, because you can't read in a book how to become a leader).

Even as the doctor in charge of the medical wing, you're limited, the artificial gravity holding you down to the metallic floor. Medicine is rationed, doses restricted because supplies have to last another century before the ground is survivable again. You used to imagine that you would be saving lives, but the Ark isn't that dangerous of a place. Most of the injuries you treat are accidental, and the illnesses outweigh them so far the scale might as well just tip completely.

But everything is okay. Good, even. You have Jake and Clarke, the job you've wanted since you were eleven years old, friends who crowd into your apartment to watch old games from the ground that most of the remaining human population doesn't know the rules to. Maybe you're spending a little more time each day staring out through space at the planet you're circling around. Maybe the oxygen quality on the Ark is steadily deteriorating, Jake's team scrambling to fix it and yours struggling to keep up with the increasing sicknesses it passes around. But it will be okay (it has to be, right?).

So when Jake discovers a problem, the kind of problem that sends a wave of panic rising up from somewhere between your stomach and lungs, the first thing you say is, "You'll fix it." You aren't sure how confident it sounds.

He can't meet your eyes when he answers. "Not this time."

The panic surges a little higher. This isn't how humanity is supposed to end. Humanity _isn't_ supposed to end. Everyone's predicted it will be another hundred years until the radiation on the ground will have faded enough to set foot there. A year of oxygen, maybe two – it isn't enough.

The oxygen tastes stale again, and now you know why.

Jake wants to tell everyone, but you know better. The anxiety setting deep into your bones will seep through the Ark and leave no one untouched, and all hell will break loose. You can already picture it: Someone figuring out how to float people for no reason, the guard using the guns that are only supposed to be for emergencies, violence spreading that the rationed supplies in medical can't fix. But he won't listen.

"Promise me."

"I can't."

"They'll float you, Jake. If you do this, I won't be able to stop it."

But you try anyway. You try to stop it before it really starts – Thelonious will be able to talk him out of it, Jake's always listened to him. They've been friends since before you paid attention to either of them. Jake will listen to him. It doesn't happen the way you plan. You think later that you shouldn't be surprised by this, but after everything else in your life has worked out exactly the way you want it to, why should you have thought this would be any different?

You fight for him; you know you won't win, not against everyone else on the Council, but you try anyway. It doesn't happen the way you want it to, either. Everything seems blurry and grey until you see him again. The Ark has never been colourful, all muted tones in the depths of space, but any life that was left in your surroundings seems to have been drained.

He has a guard on each side of him when they bring him down the hall to the airlock. You've been here a million times before and it's hurt every time (you're a _doctor,_ you're supposed to save lives, not stand by while they're ripped away) but this is worse. The guilt pins you down, weighs on your shoulders and winds through the soles of your shoes into the floor, rooting you in place even when you try to move anyway. So you hover behind Thelonious until Jake looks at you. Meet his eyes and know that he knows, that he's completely aware that you're the reason he's standing here now. He only says two words: "Hey, baby" (you know what they mean: _I understand)._

Your feet come unrooted from the floor and you're moving, arms winding around him like maybe if you hold him tight enough, they won't be able to take him (but you know better, if Jaha is ready to let Jake go, maybe he won't hesitate to call you a traitor, too, float you together and leave Clarke on her own).

"You have to warn them, Abby. The Ark's dying, there's no choice."

But there's always a choice. There's Earth. Scientists can be wrong, predictions can be off. A low chance of survival is better than a certain end to humanity when the oxygen runs out (right?). Maybe (just maybe, the slimmest of slim chances) your dream could be real. Maybe you could go the ground. Maybe you could see it.

"I love you," he says to Clarke before he steps into the airlock. He doesn't say it to you (you don't deserve it, after what you've done to him). But he smiles at you, or maybe at your daughter, you can't really tell, before they pull the lever. You like to pretend it's at you, that it means he forgives you. It helps you sleep at night.

And so you're left with his wedding ring in your hand and your daughter next to you, watching her father die and clinging to you because she doesn't know it was you, voice breaking as she says, "I'm so sorry." And you tell her it's not her fault, because it isn't.

It's yours.

And then they take Clarke, too.

You hate Jaha for it, at first. Hate Kane, hate the rest of the Council for taking your daughter away from you for knowing a secret. But you hate yourself more. You stand in your empty apartment and put Jake's ring on a chain around your neck and pretend you can live with yourself.

You focus all of your energy on the ground, on helping organize the decision to send people down and find out if it's survivable. Does radiation affect oxygen? Is the air on Earth stale and dusty and thin like the air on the Ark? You have a million questions and no real answers. You help with the bracelets that check vitals and transmit information to a command centre on the Ark. You vote yes on everything until the Council is deciding whether to use kids from lockup; that's where you draw the line, because one of those kids is _yours._ Kane gives the fourth vote for a majority pass, and it fuels your anger, at him for voting yes and at yourself for not being able to stop it.

At least you get to say goodbye, sort of. Clarke is full of panic, breath too shallow, too quick, when she spins to face you. She thinks she's being led to the airlock where you last saw Jake. You place your hands on her shoulders and tell her the truth, almost (not quite). "You're being sent to the ground. All 100 of you. This gives you a chance to live. But be careful. I can't lose you, too."

And so this is how humanity either begins a new chapter or closes the book entirely, places it on the shelf to gather dust: With you letting your daughter be shot with a tranquilizer gun, holding onto her like you'll never see her again – because guess what? Maybe you _won't._ "Earth, Clarke," you whisper into her hair as she loses consciousness. "You get to go to Earth."

You've always wanted to go to the ground. At least one of you will.


End file.
